The Neuroscience of Habits

How often have you said to yourself on a Monday “Today I’m going to make that change”, and by Friday you’ve forgotten that you even said that, let alone tried? You did it for two days, and then somehow, it’s the end of the week and you’ve completely forgotten that you made that promise to yourself. Your brain does this because it likes to take shortcuts by operating without thought; your brain does this to save energy for more mentally challenging tasks. 

Mental heuristics are shortcuts that your brain takes to problem solve and make decisions, if you’ve always brushed your teeth with your right hand, for example, then your brain isn’t going to actively remind you every morning to use that hand, teeth brushing with the right hand is going to be automatic and go without thought. But if all of a sudden you wanted to start doing it differently, you’d need an element of a conscious effort to change that. Every morning you would need to remind yourself that you’re not going to use the right hand anymore, but instead, you’re going to start trying with the left; and at first, that will get uncomfortable, and you’ll most likely forget too because using the right hand is so deeply ingrained in your brain that it happens with so much automaticity that you only realise it after you’ve done it. Your brain is not going to remind you that you need to spend energy trying to use your left hand; that is why it is so hard to try and break a habit when you are “stuck in your ways”. Most of our behaviours and the way that we operate through the world is automatic and governed by our subconscious mind, and it takes an immense amount of energy to try and go against that grain and create new pathways.

Step 1: Neuroplasticity

For a long time, we thought that the adult brain was fixed, but that isn’t true. Whilst it is harder to make plastic changes as adults, it is not impossible, it just requires a little bit more attention and intention. A child’s brain absorbs everything it can from its environment, and they learn passively, however, as adults, we need to actively tell ourselves what is important and what isn’t by paying attention to what is. For example, you wouldn’t be able to put on a French tape in the background and expect to learn to speak French. You would need to pay attention to the words, it’s also why studying whilst scrolling on social media isn’t doing you any favours. For adult plasticity, the prerequisites are that the brain is paying attention to whatever it needs to learn. And then, through means of plasticity, we need to strengthen those new connections through repetition until they become engrained and automatic.

Pay attention to what it is you want to change and remind yourself every day. This is why checking in with a coach/ habit tracker/ morning routine/meditation can really work. And repeat it every single day, even on the days when you don’t feel like it. Your brain is going to try and resist the change, but you need to push through it. Even if your goal is to run 5km and one day you don’t want to, still go outside and walk, even if it’s 1km, the habit of turning up is more powerful than we think.

Step 2: Cues and triggers 

Usually, we need a cue that then triggers us to execute a particular action. For example, you walk into the kitchen and without even thinking about it, you’re eating cookies. Or you’re not a big drinker yet every time you go to the pub with your friends, you can’t help but crave a beer. That’s because your brain has been conditioned to do these things in these circumstances. It’s like a sequence of events that trigger each other in a domino-like effect where your neurons fire in an arrangement one after the other leading you to particular actions and outcomes. It’s so engrained that it’s as automatic as brushing your teeth with your right hand. 

Your task is to try and assess your cues and triggers and see what it is that’s stopping you from reaching your goals. For example, you know that if you don’t prep your lunch the night before, you’ll end up trying to resist the cafeteria lunch all morning whilst you’re at work, just to wind up there anyway because the clock strikes 12 and you’re reminded that they have those super greasy empanadas you love/hate. You’ll be tired and your inhibition will be compromised, and mental heuristics will take over, and your brain will take the easiest route, going downstairs to buy empanadas instead of walking to the store and buying yourself a healthier meal.

Step 3: Circadian phases to change

Phase 1

Biologically, your brain and body have higher levels of norepinephrine and dopamine in the first 8 hours of your day upon waking. These two molecules are responsible for giving you motivation and drive, both physically and mentally. Putting your more challenging habit changes in the earlier parts of your day will be more efficient in ensuring you’re following through with executing these tasks. For example, you’ll find it much easier to do an ice bath or go for a run earlier in the day than you would if you had to put them in at the end of your day. Perhaps at lunchtime if first thing before work is too hard due to having to wake up early. If you wake up at 6 am, your 8-hour cut-off point is somewhere around 2 pm.

Phase 2

As you approach the evening, your body is increasing serotonin for melatonin production, and therefore, your brain and body are ‘calmer’, thus, incorporating the less energy-demanding tasks in this part of your day will be more beneficial. For example, incorporating a meal prep routine or a yoga/meditation practice in the later hours of your day can help set you up for success the next day. Of course, meditation and yoga are not limited to evening practices but are merely being used as an example. Yoga is not necessarily easier than running, and it’s context-dependent. If you’re already a good runner then creating a running habit in the evening is not going to be challenging for you, and you may find that creating a habit for doing yoga is harder, therefore, yoga should go in the morning and running can be an evening activity. The point is that you pick what you find harder and put it in the earlier hours of your day, and the tasks that you find easier to achieve can be slotted into the second phase of your day.

Phase 3

Meditation and sleep. Your brain has a finite amount of energy allocated for each day and attention span, which we call this vigilance; and as you go through your day, we experience something called vigilance decrement, it’s the inability to focus after a long period. This happens especially if we’re not taking any mental breaks throughout the day; a lot of the time, people smoke, drink caffeine and scroll on social media during their breaks at work, but those tasks are still energy-demanding on the brain. Your brain is not taking a break and therefore, vigilance decrement is increasing (attention span across the day is going down). Meditating can be a powerful tool to help you replenish brain energy resources; it doesn’t need to be fancy; you can just close your eyes for 20 minutes during the day and let yourself relax for a bit. If you don’t want to meditate, you can go for a walk, ideally alone, and ‘clear your head’. This means that by the afternoon, you’re still making some sound decisions instead of acting on impulse and ignoring your attempts to create new habits. Sleep is your most powerful tool and that is where memory consolidation happens. Memory consolidation is when everything you’ve learned in the day gets stored in your brain as a memory. If you’re not getting good quality sleep, you will struggle to incorporate changes because your brain will prioritise energy for other tasks, not breaking old habits and creating new ones. You won’t want to put in the effort anyway, so sleep is your #1 tool (see previous article here).

Step 4: Preparing for setbacks.

Preparing for setbacks is an extremely important step in ensuring that you achieve lasting change. By preparing for setbacks, it means that when they arise, we are better prepared. The brain likes familiarity, and sometimes, as humans, we can struggle with unexpected changes, and we can often see them as an excuse to duck out on our journey to habitual change because it’s easier to go down the path that is more travelled, and we’ll take any excuse we can to go down that road. Setbacks can be things like, children, tiredness, laziness, fear, unexpected travel, travelling for work etc. Preparing for the setbacks, and knowing that they may come, and when they do, we can make an informed decision about how we proceed. It is one of the most valuable and under-utilised tools to create habitual change.

A perfect tool for eliminating any setbacks and making sure you stay prepared is to subscribe to getting your protein delivered. This eliminates the chance of you forgetting to do it; remember, the brain likes to take shortcuts and if you’re not in the habit of ordering your protein in time, you may find that you keep forgetting, and potentially sabotage your progress. By ordering your protein on subscription, it can also serve as the perfect cue to remind you about your goals because the brain needs cues to execute actions.

Remember, we can change at any age, the neuroscience of brain plasticity shows that with enough attention, intention and repetition, we can become whoever we want, and it is by virtue of association between the neurons in our brain that we can create our own minds.

Written by Nicole Vignola